SciShow is a well-done, interesting YouTube channel. While not overlytechnical, they do a good job of “making curiosity contagious,” as theylike to say. The channel is diverse–there is a playlist of the world’s mostasked questions, such as what is the meaning of life and why is the skyblue? There is also SciShow News, a round-up of some of the mostinteresting science stories of the week; SciShow Dose, quick doses ofscience tidbits; and SciShow infusions, a more in-depth, scientific lookinto a variety of topics. In two other features, SciShow examines theminds of some of humanity’s greatest scientists, and visits some of theworld’s oddest places, like the Pennsylvania town that has been on firefor 50 years.

● www.youtube.com/user/scishow/featured

The non-profit World Science U is anonline teaching platform that provides aunique educational experience for anyuser. Taught by founder and famousphysicist Brian Greene–along with otherrenowned professors–the website offerscourses that let you spend minutes,hours, days or months on a subject,Unplugged, Master Classes and Courses. Science Unplugged provides hundredsof short video answers to a wide range of questions from “What is a Higgs Parti-cle?” to “What happens to time near a black hole?” Master classes are designedby prestigious scientists from leading research universities. The material cangenerally be covered in a few hours. Students can earn World Science U certifi-cation upon successful class completion. The short courses, suitable for a broadspectrum of learners, typically require two to three weeks to complete and haveno homework or exams. University courses are university-level offerings that typ-ically require eight to 10 weeks to complete. Students work at their own pace andcan earn World Science U certification upon successful course completion.

● www.worldscienceu.com

KNOWLEDGE FOR EVERYONE: WORLD SCIENCE U

Ever feel small in this big world?
If so, this interactive won’t help
you. It will do the opposite. From
designer Whitevinyl, the “Here
is Today” interactive is based on
a simple but visually appealing
user interface. First, it gives you
today’s date. Press the “Okay”

button a few times and get the month, year and century.
Keep going for the millennium and the current epoch on
the geologic scale. While you are doing this, the timeline
that you started with–that originally showed just the day–
gets smaller and smaller. If you push even further, the timeline shows the formation of Earth, life, oxidation, animals
and last but not least, the universe. By the time you are at
the end, the little block that once represented the present is
so small–in the scheme of things–that you can’t even see it
anymore. The changing, interactive timeline is an interesting way to put time in perspective.